New student-curated exhibit in UMD Performing Arts Library focuses on 1970s Counterculture
“Voices of the Counterculture” is available to view in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library through the Fall 2024 semester
This summer, students in the First-Year Innovation and Research Experience (FIRE) summer program led by Dr. Elizabeth Massey, the assistant clinical professor who leads FIRE’s Music and Social Identity stream, worked with Special Collections in Performing Arts (SCPA) in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library and Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) in Hornbake Library to research and create an exhibit titled “Voices of the Counterculture,” focused on social and cultural themes from the 1970s.
Through their research and exploration process, the students identified five key themes of the decade: the Vietnam War, the burgeoning movement for LGBTQ+ rights, the contributions of Black artists and activists, youth activism, and psychedelic drugs. Then, with the help of SCPA Program Manager Ben Jackson, University Archivist Natalie Trapuzzano, and other UMD Libraries faculty and staff, they dug through UMD Libraries’ special collections, selecting posters, magazines, photographs, fanzines and other memorabilia reflecting those themes at UMD and nationally. The “High Week” advertisement shown on the poster for the exhibition is from the University of Maryland Posters and Broadsides collection within University Archives and highlights the agenda for new student orientation in 1970.
“We’re always looking for new ways for SCPA’s collections to be used for new creative work, especially by members of the campus community that have had limited experience working with archival collections,” said Jackson. “Getting to see a group of students experience wonder as they sifted through records and fliers was fulfilling in its own right, but all the more so as they channeled that awe into their own research and curation. Even though the themes of the exhibit are familiar to many, because their work began with and centered the primary sources unique to our campus special collections and archives, the insights were based on new evidence and represent novel contributions to scholarship. Which is to say, the students were able to learn from and became personally invested in our collections through open access and the freedom to follow their own curiosity and passion.”